“TMVTL,” a grisly cut off Benny the Butcher’s new album, Everybody Can’t Go, is the kind of unfiltered street rap the Buffalo, New York, rapper excels in. Here he uses three different beats to narrate three different tales — of a former kingpin who blackmails his correctional officer, of a woman who sleeps with two brothers and ends up murdered, and of a rapper who seeks revenge. As Benny told me one afternoon last November, “People love stories that keep them at the edge of the seat.”
Benny the Butcher began his career with a series of gloomy mixtapes in the late 2000s before breaking through as one-third of the rap collective Griselda alongside his cousins Westside Gunn and Conway the Machine. The trio’s corner-dwelling rhymes and fine-art aesthetics turned them into stars, with Benny establishing his own lane through no-frills narratives about the minutiae of drug dealing and incarceration. Since his 2018 solo album, Tana Talk 3, he has remained one of rap’s most consistent voices, earning him a management deal with Roc Nation, collabs with rap greats like Pusha T and J. Cole (plus an unreleased one with Drake, but more on that later), his own record label, and a deal with Def Jam, with which he signed in 2021 with the support of Snoop Dogg.
Benny says the just-released Everybody Can’t Go, his first on the legendary label, is the best Def Jam album since DMX’s classic debut, It’s Dark and Hell Is Hot — a clear indicator of Benny’s aim to bring uncompromising street rap to a major market. “I’m at the next level of the game,” he says, “and I’m sharing it with people.”
You signed with Def Jam in 2021 after more than a decade as an independent artist. What are you getting out of being on a major label that you weren’t before?
Well, just in literal terms, I’ve been on a press run for one song that, in the past, would be equal to like two of my press runs for whole albums. So their reach is further. The process runs a little slower. It’s more hands in the pot. But there’s more brains thinking collectively toward my project. How could you be mad at that? I just stay prepared to give them the music, and they’re gon’ do the job. So I love it. And another thing — I was thinking about this when I woke up — I chose to be here. Everybody I work with, from Roc Nation to Griselda to Def Jam, I choose.
From what I heard, you passed on Def Jam’s initial deal. Then Snoop, who is working with the label as an executive consultant, hit you up, asked you what the issue was, and made a call on your behalf.
I just told him it wasn’t what I wanted. The numbers ain’t match … [Snoop said] “I’m gonna call them with you and you just tell him what you want, specifically, out of your mouth.” Snoop did that for me.
Did you have a relationship with Snoop before this?
No, I was introduced to Snoop through Def Jam. I guess that’s why they introduced me to him, so he could speed it up like that. You know, Snoop was in my position before. It’s easier to maybe talk to an artist than talking to managers and lawyers. I love my managers and I love my lawyers. But I mean, we’re rappers. Snoop just put it in a language to me that I can understand. He ain’t gotta do that. He could have been doing that for somebody from the West Coast.
When I first met him, he had a beat playing as I’m walking in. I know I’m going to meet Snoop, so I’m gonna kill his beat. I’m about to impress this nigga. So I had that on my mind, too. That one ended up on his album, on a song with ’Kiss and Busta Rhymes. That meant a lot, because coming up in his game, you need all the help you can get. And I’m not even saying the cosign. I’m saying that knowledge that I got from him. The conversations that we had. I needed that.
Hit-Boy and the Alchemist produced Everybody Can’t Go. What’s it like working with each of them?
There’s a lot of similarities. Both of them — a lot of producers, really — will sit in the studio and smoke. Those guys really don’t say too much besides the direction that they give me at the beginning. They let me know what they hear or what the beat reminds them of, let me know what direction I should go in, then I get to writing. Sometimes I don’t see them until I’m finished with the song. They’re doing other shit, running back and forth, poking their head in the studio. But that’s it. I get in my own world, and they’re like, “He’s off in the clouds right now.”
My favorite song on the album is “TMVTL,” which stands for “trust is more valuable than love.” It features three separate stories over three separate beats. What’s the story behind that track?
I wrote a song like this when I was locked up, but I ended up losing the paper. I wanted to re-create that vibe. I was just trying to write something that would intrigue me. I think the three different beats, that was Al’s idea. That’s that old Griselda feel. I wanted to overdo it.
Another highlight is “How to Rap,” where you drop a lot of knowledge for other artists. You tell them to search for other sources of income and stay around people who will keep you focused. What’s one thing you wished you had known before you got in the industry?
It’s a lot that I wish I would have known. But to be honest with you, I kind of knew a lot back then. It was all about who I knew. I wish I knew the players who were moving and shaking who were on the front line. I wish I would have met some A&Rs earlier. I didn’t know none of them. I wish I would have established relationships with people like that, not saying to get a deal that early, but to have been on people’s minds that early. I was just staying in Buffalo, and all my hardest work just landed in the streets. People were fucking with it, but it really wasn’t moving me toward the game. It was keeping me stagnant.
You recorded with Drake a few years ago. How did you two end up connecting?
Toronto’s not far from Buffalo. When he shouts out the radio station 93.7 on his albums, that’s like our Hot 97 back home. Toronto’s only an hour away, so they share that radio station with us. I maybe knew about Drake earlier than everybody because I’m a little closer. And I’m pretty sure that he got the Griselda wave when it was going on. He’s a bar spitter, so he’s got respect for the art and for the culture, too. I think I hit him up after his Rap Radar interview, since they spoke about us briefly. He sent the record a few months later.
Why is the Drake record not on Everybody Can’t Go? This is your Def Jam debut, as much of an occasion as ever.
[Chuckles] Why is the Drake record not on it? I don’t know, I don’t know. Well, I do know the answer, but I don’t know why that’s the answer. This is the music business. We did the music part, all there was left to do was the business part, but it is what it is. Maybe we’ll have another chance. I know people wanted to hear that.
You got into two small controversies recently —
— I did?
Yeah, on Twitter.
Oh, okay. Twitter controversy ain’t really controversial to me. I be in real shit outside. I thought some shit happened! [Laughs]
You said fans today should appreciate the music more and be less critical. Was there something specific you saw that day that made you say that?
I wouldn’t react off of one thing for me to say that. I’ve been sitting back witnessing people being ungrateful for the music. I know it’s a lot of bullshit artists out there. You hear people say all the time, “There’s no real rap now.” And then people get to tagging me and tagging everybody else where they feel like “Where’s the real rappers?” Like, what you mean? You’re not looking for it in the right way. So I’m just saying, enjoy the music. Anybody who does their craft at the top level, we respect your opinion. But if your opinion don’t got credit behind it, what’s the opinion? As much as I love the Buffalo Bills, you think I know what kind of office they need to be running? That’s really the harsh reality of it. People feel like, “Damn, my opinion don’t matter?” Of course your opinion matters. But it’s a different thing to weaponize your opinion. I’ve been seeing that a lot, because it’s been cool to shit on rappers lately. Basically, that’s what I’m saying. I think people need to dial back on that; they’re doing too much.
The other Twitter controversy —
— I love Twitter controversy! [Laughs].
People were surprised when you tweeted support of Donald Trump. What made that something that you wanted to share? And what made you feel confident enough not to be afraid of it impacting your relationship with your fan base?
This is what I’m say about that right there: I see why people don’t share their political opinions. I learned something that day.
That’s all you have to say about it?
That’s what I learned that day.
One thing Griselda doesn’t get enough credit for is how much each of you have grown as rappers over the past few years. Do you guys suggest things to each other that you think will help someone get better?
It’s not like that, it’s subtle things. West just texted me an hour ago and sent me a beat to do. He’s like, “Yo Bugs, I need you to go crazy. You know how you went on this? You need to take this direction on that.” That’s what makes me better. Having direction makes me better. I love having direction. That’s why anybody I work with, I let them do their job. I love that. It makes the job easier, actually. Conway definitely helped me like that while working on my albums. I remember working on Tana Talk 3, when he was telling me, “Don’t feel like you got to do what we doing. Do you. Rap how you rap. Be yourself. Don’t feel like you can’t be you, talk that slick, dope boy talk on these beats.” That definitely helped me be better.
Last time we spoke was right before your EP The Plugs I Met 2, when you were shot in Houston.
Yup. Three years ago today.
There are obviously going to be adjustments that you make in your day-to-day life when something like that happens. How do you cope with it?
I deal with it physically, every day. And I definitely watch the circles that I be in. It’s not like I was in a circle where that happens. But I’m taking caution on everything now — shit that I didn’t maybe need to take caution on: watching how I move, keeping security with me, just protecting the quarterback. There’s a lot of things that the old me would have fun doing that the new me can’t do. I’m disciplining myself. I learned a lot of lessons like that. That was a wake-up call.
It definitely is odd to me to go through everything I’ve done in the streets and never to get shot. How crazy is that, right? Mu’fuckas expect to get shot. Everybody around me has been shot. My wife’s mother has been shot before. So it was like, I felt like I escaped. But in all actuality, you never escape. Danger is everywhere. It’s about protecting yourself and thinking smart. But I’m good now, trust me. I learned how to walk. It took me a while to get back on my feet. I walked with a brace, I had a wheelchair, I had a walker. I bought all those gadgets. My therapist put me back together. I’m good as new, almost.
Since we last spoke, you started your label, the Black Soprano Family, and your own sports agency, bought a cannabis farm, got married. How much of a challenge is it to maintain all those things while prepping a major-label debut?
It’s hard because that’s what you got to do. But it’s really not that hard. You go on tour and when it’s time to record, you record. That’s what I signed up for. I have fun doing this shit, waking up and running around every day. Rappers, we love to be in recording mode. After we toured, after we sat back and partied and lived our life, we want to go rap about it!
This interview has been edited and condensed.
